About the Seminar

The current global order is increasingly characterised by great power competition and the erosion of international law and multilateral cooperation. Secondary actors such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the European Union (EU), which lack significant coercive power projection capabilities, are particularly exposed to these trends. This presentation examines how the EU navigates the Sino-US rivalry by de-risking from both powers without decoupling: reducing security dependence on the United States and economic dependence on China. In this context, the Indo-Pacific offers opportunities to broaden security and economic partnerships. The EU is generally a welcome partner in this region, because many governments, particularly in Southeast Asia, pursue hedging strategies to reduce their dependencies on China and the US. As the EU and ASEAN – the two most deeply integrated regional organisations – face similar geopolitical challenges, the presentation concludes with an assessment of how they can learn from each other’s strategies and deepen their collaboration to strengthen the regional rules-based order.

About the Speaker

Alfred Gerstl is an international relations specialist, with a geographic focus on the Indo-Pacific and in particular Southeast Asia. He is an Associate Professor at the Department of Asian Studies at Palacký University Olomouc (Czech Republic). There he led the EU-funded project “The EU in the volatile Indo-Pacific” (EUVIP; 2023–2025). Moreover, Alfred is President of the Central European Institute of Asian Studies (CEIAS), a transnational think tank with offices in Bratislava (Slovakia) and Prague (Czech Republic). At CEIAS, he leads the EU-funded project “European-Southeast Asian relations: current relations and future prospects” (EUSEAR; 2024–2026). Furthermore, Alfred is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Vienna (Department of East Asian Studies) and a sessional lecturer at the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna. In the past, he was a Visiting Professor in Japan (2025) and an Associate Professor in Russia (2018/19).